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Sunday, January 02, 2011

Hopping John Soup Recipe for Luck in the New Year (Black-Eyed Pea, Ham, and Collard Greens Soup)

Black-Eyed Pea, Ham, and Collard Greens Soup (Hopping John Soup) is my favorite dish to make for good luck in the New Year!

For several years now I've been making this tasty Hopping John Soup with black-eyed peas, ham, and collard greens for good luck in the New Year, and this year when I made a double batch I remembered and took some step-by-step photos. Not only does this soup have all the luck-bringing properties of Hopping John, it's also a South Beach Diet phase one recipe for those who are starting out the year with phase one, like I always do! Hopping John is traditionally made on New Year's Day, but truly this tasty soup is great to make all during the cold months, whenever you need a little dose of good luck.

If you're not familiar with Hopping John, it's eaten throughout the southern U.S. on New Year's Day. The origin of the name Hopping John is uncertain, but it's thought to have come from the Creole French pronunciation of the pigeon peas used in the dish. Recipe variations for Hopping John abound, but all contain ham, black eyed peas, and collard greens, the peas representing coins and the collard greens representing dollar bills for financial luck in the new year. I took the Hopping John ingredients of black-eyed peas, ham, and collard greens and turned them into a soup a few years ago, and the recipe has been a hit ever since.

Hopping John Soup was updated with step-by-step photos January 2011. This is the photo from the original post of this recipe, when I used to make the dish with frozen black-eyed peas. A few years ago I started having trouble finding the frozen ones and now I usually use canned black-eyed peas, which seem to be a little darker. Sometimes I cook this soup a little longer now, which breaks up the beans more like they are in the top photo above. But whichever type of beans you use, and whether you use the longer or shorter cooking time, this will be delicious!

Chop the onions and celery and then saute in olive oil for about 5 minutes, or just until they start to soften. Then add minced garlic and saute about 2 minutes more.

While the onions saute chop the ham. (If you ham has a rind, save it to add to the soup for more flavor.) After onions/celery/garlic mixture is done, add the chopped ham and saute over very low heat for about 10 minutes.

In a large soup pot, add the ham/onion/celery/garlic mixture, chicken stock, black-eyed peas, dried thyme, and ham rinds if you have them. Let this cook at a low simmer for about an hour. (These photos are a double batch of soup.)

While the soup simmers, cut away the thick inner rib of the collard greens, then coarsely chop the greens.

After soup has simmered for one hour, taste for flavor, adding some ham flavor base if needed and adding a little water if the soup seems too thick. Add chopped collard greens to the soup and let simmer for about one hour more.

Here's how my soup looked after it simmered for an hour, with the collard greens and beans both very soft and starting to dissolve into the soup.

When the black-eyed peas are as sort as you'd like, remove the ham rind and then use an immersion blender to partially puree the soup, being careful not to overdo it if you want a soup with some chunkiness to it. Add the red pepper flakes and vinegar and simmer 10 minutes more (or longer; I sometimes cook it an hour or so longer at this point.) Serve hot and enjoy the good luck!

Hopping John Soup (Black-eyed Pea, Ham, and Collard Green Soup)
(Makes 6-8 servings, recipe created by Kalyn with inspiration from The Gourmet Cookbook.)

In large frying pan, saute onion and celery in olive oil about 5 minutes, until starting to soften. Add garlic and saute 2 minutes more, then add ham and saute over very low heat 10 minutes. (Don't skip this step, which concentrates the ham flavor into the vegetables.)

Transfer mixture to large soup pot, add chicken stock, black eyed peas, dried thyme, and ham rinds if available, and cook at very low simmer for one hour.

After soup has cooked one hour, taste for flavoring. Add more water and ham flavor base if needed. (It will depend on your ham, but I usually add a tiny bit. I added about 2 cups more water to the soup at this point.) Add chopped collard greens, stir into soup and simmer one hour more, or until black-eyed peas are quite soft.

When black-eyed peas are as soft as you want them, remove pieces of ham rind, then use an immersion blender, food processor, or hand masher to partially process about half the soup. You want a mixture of broken and unbroken black-eyes peas, with some thickening of the soup from the pureeing process. Be careful not to over process. Add red pepper flakes and vinegar and simmer 10 minutes more (or longer, I sometimes cook as much as an hour more at this point.) Serve hot.

Black-eyed peas are considered a "good" carb on the South Beach Diet. If you wanted to reduce the carb count for the soup or be able to eat a larger serving for phase one, use more ham, celery, and collard greens in proportion to the other ingredients. This soup would be approved for any phase of the South Beach Diet, but limit serving sizes for phase one when dried beans are limited to 1/3 to 1/2 cup serving size.

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I know Kalyn is not blogging right now but does anyone know if leftover HoneyBaked ham would work here (taking off the glazed crust of course)? And also can spinach or something else be substituted for the collard greens?

Mrs. L., honeybaked ham wouldn't be good for South Beach, but otherwise there's no reason you couldn't use it in this recipe. I'm not sure about subbing spinach for collard greens, the flavor is quite different. Collard greens have a very mild, almost sweet flavor when they're cooked. Swiss chard would be a closer substitute, or cabbage would also be a good choice. If all you have is spinach, of course you could use it, but it would be a very different soup. Let me know if you try it that way.

I went to Kalyn's party and tried some of the soup. Now I am not much for collard greens, but I did like the soup very much. Kalyn always has many wonderful choices of soup at this party---I loved all of them.Thanks Kalyn for letting us enjoy your cooking and your company.

Great! I had no idea what to do with my leftovers! I hosted lunch for my in-laws today with the traditional southern NY Day items and her words were "you did very good for an European"...ehehehe!!!This soup is my list for tomorrow!

Thanks for helping me create a tradition. This is my second year of making this soup for New Year's Day. One tip: I don't like how green the soup turns from the pulverized collard greens when a portion is ground up by the immersion blender. So I do that step before adding the greens.

Anonymous, so happy that you're making this soup into a tradition I haven't noticed that mine gets that green (maybe I don't blend it as long) but good idea to blend before adding the collards if you want them more whole

Kalyn!!! I loved the Hopping John Soup, as well as the Black Bean one!!! Thank you so much for letting me get to know you this year, and for all your cooking tips, lessons, and good food to come in the new year.

Kalyn: Great time at your Soup and Conversation party on New Years Day...quite a nice crowd, especially seeing old friends (from 15 years ago?) Your four soups were lip smacking delicious. I tasted the Hopping John soup first for good luck in 2011, and then the others. All were outstanding. Thanks again.Wanda

Last night I cooked and served the Hopping John, Collard greens blackeye pea soup with a side of your sweet potato corn bread which I made into muffins. The meal was delicious. My picky husband ate every bit and complimented me on the meal. It was a fantastic twist on traditional southern dishes. Your recipes ROCK!!BCR

Another year, another soup! Last year I was in our Natural Food store around NY, & was offered a cup of Hopping John soup - so this year I decided to make my own. Found your recipe, got cans of beans & some Kale from a local farmer at our Saturday Market! When my kids were young, we grew collards & kale, & found we liked the kale better, so let the chickens have the collards!! Herbalist Susun Weed suggests cooking kale close to an hour, to break down the cell walls & make the minerals more available, so this was perfect! I used the slow cooker, & kept to the recipe - I tend to make 'soups' with more veggies - so I'll probably add some roots tomorrow - & here in Oregon, we often have celery root in winter, which would be fun!Thanks for sharing your recipe!

I was surprised and delighted by how much I loved this soup since I was not a black-eyed peas fan before. Well, I've made this soup for New Year's 2 years in a row now and plan to make it a tradition. Can't wait to try more of your recipes!

This is a hearty and very delicious dish. I wanted to stretch it a bit, so I opted to use half the ham and half the beans, but the rest unchanged. Really tasty and filling. I'll make it often - thanks and happy new year!

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